The Farrelly Brothers' attempts to make a movie based on The Three Stooges has suffered a lot of mallet shots to the head and pies to the face on it's way to the big screen. At one point the film had the powerhouse trio of Sean Penn, Jim Carrey, and Benicio Del Toro to star, but that completely fell through and the film seemed to be on life support. Then recently the entire project changed hands, going from MGM to 20th Century Fox, and now it's back and running in full speed.
According to The Wrap, things have progressed to the point where brand new contenders are being talked to about starring in the film. The shortlist apparently includes Johnny Knoxville, Andy Samberg(Saturday Night Live), and an Australian comedian named Shane Jacobson, whom I've never heard of.
The plan is to have the film ready to shoot in March, which means these guys need to get locked down pretty quick. Obviously Knoxville should have the physical, slapstick comedy down to a science by now. Samberg's experience on SNL should be a plus, although I personally have never found him to be all that funny on the big screen(Hot Rod
, anyone?). Jacobson is a wild card, who apparently hosts Top Gear over in the land Down Under. The film will be divided into three, 27-minute segments. So expect less of a biopic and more of a reinterpretation of The Stooges comedic works. If this were anything other than The Three Stooges, the addition of Knoxville and Samberg would send me running for the hills. But I think the two of them could be a perfect fit for this type of movie. At this point I'm just sorta tired of all the fits and starts, and just want to see this production get off the ground finally. The Farrelly's have been out of the comedy limelight for a little while so hopefully this'll be the movie that brings them back.
